


a future you can choose

by RingThroughSpace



Category: Queer Eye (2018), Queer Eye for the Straight Guy RPF, Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Crack Crossover, Crack Treated Seriously, Gen, I have Thoughts about The Rise of Skywalker, Post-Canon Fix-It, Screw Destiny, and Karamo and I are sitting in a room trying to process them, no betas we die like men, screw gen xerox, the Jedi really kind of suck
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2020-08-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:20:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26102584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RingThroughSpace/pseuds/RingThroughSpace
Summary: "So who do we have this week?" asked Jonathan."Her name is Rey," Karamo replied. "She's twenty seven, and a Resistance hero. She's hoping to reconstruct a Jedi Academy on the abandoned temple on Rothmyer B, though she hasn't gotten very far. She's been nominated by two of her friends, Poe and Finn, who are hoping we can help her pull her life together and build the Academy she's dreamed of."
Relationships: Antoni Porowski & Tam France & Bobby Berk & Karamo Brown & Jonathan Van Ness, Poe Dameron/Finn, Rey / Ben Solo | Kylo Ren (implied)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 8





	1. Chapter 1

_ROTHMYER: Settlements: 2 (one abandoned). Human population: 10,000. Major exports: **Skrem.** Kyber crystals (depleted)._

That was the only reference they'd found to the Jedi Temple before they'd left.

Rothmyer was a remote world in the Outer Rim, a full ten days journey from Corescant, and the Temple - the abandoned settlement, apparently - was half a continent away from the only inhabited region. It had to be. Most of the Temples built in more centrilized regions had been deliberately destroyed by the Empire, and those that hadn’t had been built over in the ensuing decades by generations with no attachment to their parents’ old faiths.

“I was lucky to even find this place,” Rey had said during their call. “It has good bones.” She hadn't said more, and the connection was too poor to request a tour.

At least the trip gave them plenty of time to do research.

" _Skrem_ ," Antoni had said when they'd pulled up the main record. "Interesting choice of crops."

They'd turned to him, and he had shrugged.

"It's a flavoring agent," he'd explained. "Rare. And dangerous. It grows best in soil laden with heavy metals. It's easy to poison yourself if you don't know what you're doing. I'll cook with it sometime."

That had been all they'd had for several days.

Jonathan had been the one to get more, through a librarian he'd befriended on Corescant. Three days into an endless trip in close quarters, they'd gotten a relay signal - two small files she'd found in an obscure offline database in one of the pre-Republic archives. Their hyperspace data charges were going to be astronomical.

"So the Temple seems to have been a training ground," Karamo said after they'd had time to read through the data. "Not a full outpost. Jedi apprentices seem to have stayed for a few years - long enough to meditate and to build lightsabers from the nearby kyber crystal mine."

"That's all they could have sustained," Antoni added. "Rothmyer can grow _skrem_ because the native soil kills Terran plants. They imported almost all their food. A lot of effort for very little result, if you ask me."

"I once went to a retreat at one of the old mines," Jonathan said. "It's hard to describe how peaceful they can be."

"It sounds like something a lot of people would spend money on," Bobby said.

Jonathan glared at him. "It's not like that."

"Isn't it?" asked Bobby.

***

The shuttle touched down just before dusk. The spaceport was little more than an overgrown field, and warm rain was sheeting down around them. Jonathan, groaning dramatically, cut a path through the shoulder-high rusty colored marsh grass that bordered the non-wooded side of the temple’s square. Tam’s shoes squelched unpleasantly in the mud and he stifled a shudder. He would have to add an all-weather cape to the Jedi uniform.

The marsh grass abruptly gave way to a rocky incline that led up to the base of the temple. The rocks were wet and precarious. _Good boots, too,_ he realized.

When he was nearly up the slope, Bobby nudged him, gesturing backwards. "Not many visitors," he whispered.

Bobby was right, of course. Turning around, squinting through the rain, Tam could finally see the entirity of the field. Apart from a battered shuttle, there wasn’t any other sign of habitation.

This far out, even the commsat would have problems reaching the rest of the world.

Now that they were above the grass, the temple loomed above them, a rocky edifice, large columns reaching up to the sky. What little Tam could make out seemed impressive enough.

“We can tour later,” Karamo muttered, pushing him forward. Tam realized then that Bobby had haulted too.

“Are you okay?” he whispered.

“Yeah,” Bobby said. “I’m fine.” And then he stepped forward, one foot in front of the next.


	2. Chapter 2

The vestibule was damp and dimly lit, but at least they were out of the direct rain. Wringing the water out of his hair, Jonathan looked around, half hoping for a butler droid with a hot drink and a towel. There wasn't one, of course. That would be too easy.

The room was open, the surface coated in a layer of mud and debris. There didn't seem to be a place to hang a coat.

"Rey?" Jonathan called. In the corner, a blue BB unit whirled to life.

Antoni, his cape still dripping water, walked up to the droid, knelt down, and held out his hand. "Where's Rey?" he asked.

The droid extended out a pincer to scan him, then tweeted something and rolled through the doorway.

A minute later - long enough for Tam, Bobby, and Karamo to stumble in - Jonathan heard footsteps in the side hall. A red light flickered on. He saw Rey's shadow before he saw her.

And then she was there, the last of the Jedi. Willowy, strongly built, sunburnt skin, brown hair bound up in a far too tight utilitarian knot. He wondered if she used moisturizer. Most of their other clients had greeted them warmly, but Rey only gave them a slight smile. "Hello," she said. "I see you've found it here." She made no move to embrace them.

"We did," Antoni said after a moment. "Will you show us around?"

****

The sunlight was just streaming through the quartz window of his room when Bobby awoke. In the adjacent rooms, no one seemed to be moving. It would be a few hours before breakfast.

_Time to explore._

You could learn a lot from architecture, Bobby had found. There were so many styles - half of them crafted for non-humans - and the builder's choices told you things about their intent that even they weren't necessarily aware of. More than one young couple's dream house lacked room for a child. 

There was plenty of exploration to do at the Temple. There was also plenty of information to glean.

The Temple seemed to follow the same plan as the blueprints Bobby had pulled for those constructed on other systems. The hallway from the central vestibule where they had originally entered split the building neatly in half. On one side were the cells and personal quarters - dozens of tiny rooms, plus a large room that was presumably a dormitory. On the other was the common areas that allowed the Temple to function - a large dining hall with adjacent kitchen (abandoned and dirty), a set of meeting rooms and workshops, and a large room holding an antiquated generator and the machinery necessary to sustain the Temple functions.

Even Jedi needed a radioactive core to power the lights, apparently.

There were no steps in most places. His were the first to tred through this place in hundreds of years. Rey's footsteps led to the generator room but not much further. Any active defenses must have been dead for centuries, yet whatever wildlife existed on Rothmyer stayed away.

He finally found himself in the back gardens. From what he had gleaned, it should have been a lush area, one of the few bright areas of green amidst the copper-tinged marshland plants. Instead, it was dead, the raised beds filled with rocky mud, a central stone fountain filled with only a few inches of stagnant water

He walked to the edge of the raised terrace and looked over the low walls, onto the marsh below. Red grass stood above the standing water, and giant moth-like insects fluttered between white flowers. Nothing seemed to make its way up to the Temple.

Perhaps it was the centuries of disuse, but the place made his skin crawl.

He could almost see the Temple as it had once been, clusters of children meditating, young adults practicing calisthenics around a flowing fountain. He turned his head, studying the flickering fountain, when out of the corner of his eye, something _moved_.

He stiffled a scream.

"What are you up to?" Antoni asked, stepping from under an overhang.

"I'm the interior designer," Bobby snapped. "It's my job to explore. Why are _you_ here?"

"I couldn't sleep," Antoni said. "This place gives me the creeps."

"Even the plants seem not to like it," Bobby said, gesturing at the dead planters. He'd found a mass of dead plants once in a basement in Coruscant, sitting by a window that had been covered for a decade. That had been funny. This was just sad.

"The native soil's poisonous," said Antoni. "It's probably contaminated the planters over the years." He walked over to one of the few functional planters - a sparkling stone vase holding sickly-looking red bushes - and smiled wryly. "Look at what they were growing." He plucked a leaf, chewed it thoughtfully, then spat out the remains. " _Skrem_ grass. Here, try it."

Bobby took it carefully and then chewed. The flavor was spicy and cold, with an underlying bitterness he couldn't place. Following Antoni's lead, he spat out the remains.

"At least they had a reason to be here, then."

Antoni turned around and studied Bobby for a moment. "You don't like the Jedi much," he said.

"No."

To their credit, the Jedi weren't homophobic. They believed in celibacy for _everyone_. Not that that had made it any easier for the people who had left.

At their height, the Jedi were known as masters of charity. They had taken in Force-sensitive children, most of them poor or orphaned, and raised them. They'd offered them a good education and a prestigious future.

Most of them had appreciated it.

"Did you ever meet anyone who had left?" Bobby asked, to fill the silence.

"Once," said Antoni. "I think. I was young. She was a server at a restaurant I visited with my family. She mentioned it, but I was too young to understand."

"There were several on the streets of Coruscant," Bobby said. He closed his eyes, trying to remain calm. "I met a woman once. She was a girl when she left. Fifteen. Pregnant. She had nothing. Just the clothes on her back." He inhaled. "Her daughter was Force-sensitive. They took her, too."

He shook his head. "I remember the news coverage when Luke Skywalker was trying to look for Jedi lore. He could have sought out the ones who left. But I don't think he would have liked what they could tell him."

He looked around the garden. Out of the corner of his eye, he could still see flickering images of children, unnaturally still, meditating around a central fountain. He wondered if they had been happy.

He wondered if they'd been given a choice.


End file.
